oing on.
Massachusetts immediately chose delegates, and was followed by New York.
In April, Georgia and South Carolina followed suit. Connecticut and
Maryland came on in May, and New Hampshire, somewhat tardily, in June.
Of the thirteen states, Rhode Island alone refused to take any part in
the proceedings.

[Sidenote: The Federal Convention meets at Philadelphia, May 14-25,
1787.]

The convention held its meetings in that plain brick building in
Philadelphia already immortalized as the place from which the
Declaration of Independence was published to the world. The work which
these men were undertaking was to determine whether that Declaration had
been for the blessing or the injury of America and of mankind. That they
had succeeded in assembling here at all was somewhat remarkable, when we
think of the curious medley of incidents that led to it. At no time in
this distressed period would a frank and abrupt proposal for a
convention to remodel the government have found favour. Such proposals,
indeed, had been made, beginning with that of Pelatiah Webster in 1781,
and they had all failed to break through the crust of a truly English
conservatism and dread of centralized power. Now, through what some
might have called a strange chapter of accidents, before the element of
causal sequence in it all had become so manifest as it is to us to-day,
this remarkable group of men had been brought together in a single room,
while even yet but few of them realized how thoroughly and exhaustively
reconstructive their work was to be. To most of them it was not clear
whether they were going merely to patch up the articles of
confederation, or to strike out into a new and very different path.
There were a few who entertained far-reaching purposes; the rest were
intelligent critics rather than constructive thinkers; the result was
surprising to all. It is worth our while to pause for a moment, and
observe the character and composition of one of the most memorable
assemblies the world has ever seen. Mr. Gladstone says that just "as the
British Constitution is the most subtle organism which has proceeded
from progressive history, so the American Constitution is the most
wonderful work ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose
of man."[6] Let us now see who the men were who did this wonderful
work,--this Iliad, or Parthenon, or Fifth Symphony, of statesmanship. We
shall not find that they were all great geniuses. Such is ne